Good Metals for Mokume?

[Blacksmith Jim]

Howdy folks,

I'm hoping to play around with making some Mokume soon, and was wondering if people had advice for some good metals to use. I've looked at a lot of pictures, and obviously silver and gold work great together, but I don't want to spend $$$ for just figuring stuff out. I'm planning on using quarters to start with, I'm sure they will keep me busy for a while. Are there other good common metals that look OK? I guess I'm mainly going for contrast so that the pattern can be seen easily.

Thanks!

R.C.

[Steve Sells]

copper/brass/Nickel-silver

[Woody]

I have tried the copper/brass/nickel or German Silver combo, it worked but the problem I encountered was the brass has a melting temp considerably lower than the nickel silver or the copper and it tends to melt and run out if you are not careful. Next time I will skip the brass and just use the nickel silver and copper.

[Steve Sells]

I should add, in case you don't already, while still clamped, bake your mokume billet for about an hour at 100F below the lowest melting point of the metals you are using.

[Frosty]

Jim Binnion lives in Bremerton Wa. (If I recall correctly) I don't know if he still teaches classes but I don't think there's a more knowledgeable person in the US. Deb and I wear wedding rings by Jim.

Unique Mokume Wedding Rings, Wedding Bands, Engagement Rings by James Binnion

Frosty

[Blacksmith Jim]

Frosty,

Yea, I've seen and read some of his stuff. It looks pretty amazing. I was emailing off list with a guy from the 'box, he suggested talking to Jim too. I may if I get to that point. I think I'll play with a stack of quarters a few times first. I did pick up a jewelers saw recently though, and look forward to putting it to use! I also looked at Mokume rings when my wife and I got hitched recently. The ones I saw were great, but out of my price range at the time. I once mentioned upgrading rings at some point, she didn't seem that excited about the idea for some reason

As always, thanks for the feedback.

R.C.

[Frosty]

Quarters work pretty well, nickle copper diffusion welds easily. I did a billet of copper and brass some years ago to see how it worked. I didn't know Jim at the time, I read about it in "Metal Techniques For Craftsmen" by Oppi Untract. Anyway, it worked well especially for a first attempt.

Frosty

[Clueless Amateur]

I have a wild card question:  I've seen some gorgeous anodized timascus bullets online, but what I want to know is, can titanium be forged with other metals, such as gild, silver or copper, for making mokume gane? I know there are various alloys out there, with gold and with copper, so that may be an option. Note: I am NOT trying to make a blade!  My end game is making mokume jewelry...and attempting an extreme variance of color ranges, with both heat treating copper and anodizing titanium, with stripes of bright silver and gold mixed in. Can this actually be achieved?

[Frosty]

That level diffusion welding isn't likely to be a common topic on a blacksmithing forum though most of us have done mokume, it's basically the same process as pattern welding. 

For exotic mokume questions I recommend you ask Jim Binion over at Mokume Gane dot com. 

It probably won't do any good but tell him Frosty says hi. What the hey.

Frosty The Lucky.

[patrick]

Frosty- Here are some in process pictures of twisting a large batch and then a couple of photos of finished projects that were made from the blocks I forged. Other folks made those finished products.

 

 

 

[Frosty]

Nice, I think I've seen the pistol grips before. I like low layer count high contrast. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[George N. M.]

Patrick, I certainly recognize the M1911 grips but what is the object in the last photo?  It almost looks like the head of a golf putter.

Thx.

GNM

[patrick]

You are exactly right about the putter. 

I just realized that this set of pictures was supposed to go in the thread on mokume delamination, not this one. I had the wrong thread open when I uploaded the images. My appologies.

 

Patrick

 

Follow up to the question about bonding Ti to other metals: the answer is yes it can be done and is described in the book Mokume Gane by Ian Ferguson. However, Titanium is a very reacitive metal and will form new compounds with most of the metals you might try to bond it to, such as copper. These new compounds can make the interfaces between the layers very brittle and really limit the amount of deformation you can do after bonding. I have seen succussfull billets made of alternating titanium alloys such as CP grade 2 and Ti 6-4. After anodizing, these can really have a striking contrast. The big challenge with any titanium laminates is keep oxygen out of the system because it reacts so easily with titanium.

Patrick